The Grass-fed Beef Is Always Greener
by misscyn
Summary: A vegetarian Bella gets too close for comfort to a small-time Hannibal Lector. Edward's coming, don't worry. Just give me a minute.
1. Chapter 1

Everything is, everything must be soft and beautiful. My days are surrounded by the music of flutes, by the creek tinkling by my window, water flowing down my cabin's window pane in the rain, a patch of sunlight on the wildflowers, patchouli floating on the wind. I am free, my life is free; I am a wave in the ocean, a cloud in the sky, a metaphor. Peace and love for all reasons, for whatever reason.

Except.

Except.

Except I really want a steak.

A steak. No tofu. No tempeh. No garden burger, bean cake, protein substitute bratwurst-shaped bullshit. No organic, home-grown, environmentally-sound alternative. I want a steak. From a cow. Chock full of hormones. Preferably a sirloin, but a tenderloin would do. Extra rare, cold in the middle, with salt and pepper, maybe some horseradish.

I have waited a week to confess, not sure who would be sympathetic to my plight. I feel like a junkie, pale, weak with wanting. Finally I own up one day after lunch, in the bathroom at Earthfare, to my not-so-politically correct friend Alice. I think she might be cool with it.

We're washing our hands, somewhat replete from a meal of wasabi pancakes with turnip green syrup. I can't believe we eat some of this stuff. Reminds me of the things they had on Fear Factor when I was a little kid, no shit.

I whisper at first, just to get the words out. She doesn't hear me, so I say it louder.

"I want a steak," I say again, and this time I think she hears me, although her response is merely a slightly-raised pierced eyebrow.

Emboldened, I continue.

"Doesn't even have to be a good one. I'll take a steakhouse steak, maybe even well done with Heinz 57 sauce, and an iceberg lettuce salad with thousand island dressing." Man, I am sinning now.

She harumphs then, sure I am joking. I surely am not. We have to get back to work now, and I need a plan.

"Do they even have cheap steakhouses anymore?" I ask as we get in her Prius after work. I mean, I need a steak, but I can't swing Ruth Chris on an entry-level salary.

"I think they're all closed around here, Bella. You may need to go somewhere more, you know, Velveeta friendly," she shoots me a glance out of the side of her eyes, sizing me up.

"Well, help me think," I plead. Alice pulls out on the road, deep in thought. She snaps her fingers and smiles as we careen down the freeway.

"Golden Corral," She pronounces with no small degree of triumph. "In Greenville. Wilma Christy is going tomorrow night with some church lady friends, and you just invited yourself, Miss Thing."


	2. Chapter 2

Ohhh Gawd nooo. A night with Wilma Christy? I inwardly shuddered. Still, I told myself, it would be out of town. Less likelihood of being seen by all my tree-hugging, downward-dog-posing vegetarian friends. My car's in the shop, so I'm more of a beggar than a chooser at this point.

"Fine!" I shout as I get out of the car. "I'll go if she'll take me. I'm gonna load up at the potato bar. Real sour cream. And real bacon bits. No frikkin' Fakon."

"I'll call her and see if she has room in her truck," Alice calls out the window with a smirk, tootle-looing with her left hand as she pulls out of my drive. "Drinks and appies at my house tonight. I'll send Jazz to get you."

Jazz is Alice's boyfriend, and Wilma's nephew. Her full name is Wilma Christy Hale, and she's a 70-something curmudgeon who rocks a full, blonde mustache and a graying Trumpian comb-over. She also smells like cats. And not in a good way.

She's nearly as tall as Jasper. From behind, if they're both wearing overalls, it's hard to tell much difference between the two, except that Jasper has more back. From the front she looks about seven months pregnant. Menopausal hormones are a nasty bitch. She wears old shit-kicking boots most of the time and flannels. She's not a lesbian, at least, we don't think she is. She was married once, to a local man named Harry Gaddis for about two weeks, about thirty years ago; but no one's allowed to mention it in her presence.

The story is her brand-new husband tried to kill her with rat-poisoned sausage gravy one morning after she refused to give him gambling money, and she chased him out of her yard with a wheelbarrow full of his clothes after she figured out he was a rounder. You wouldn't think a woman could really catch a man while pushing a wheelbarrow, but eyewitnesses said she did. Caught up with him about four doors down and knocked him in the knees as he was catching his breath against a fence, which toppled him in the cart. She then pushed the whole kit and kaboodle to Mackey Sorrell's chicken yard and dumped it, husband and all, in the manure pile.

Chicken Shit. That's been his nickname ever since.

So anyway, she managed to get the marriage annulled based on the length or lack of consummation, depending on whose perspective you're going by. All I know is, it's not a real good idea to piss her off in any way. Chicken Shit moved back to his old house on the other side of Asheville. Thirty years later he still breaks out in a sweat and crosses the street if he sees her downtown.

That's my steak dinner date tomorrow night. Tonight will be at Alice and Jazz's, with a couple of his horny, dreadlocked Warren Wilson friends crashing for the night, I'm sure. Again, car's in the shop, and no respectable 26-year-old wants to be stuck at home with no wheels. Gotta go grab a shower and meditate on my recent carnivorous yearnings, and the road to hell they're leading me down. Ommm.


	3. Chapter 3

I was born a poor white trash child. Well, not me, so much as my mom. She'd spent her Appalachian toddlerhood gnawing on fatback and corn pone (what is that?), so convenience foods were where it was at for Renee back in the 80's and 90's. All part of women's lib, the way she tells it. Working women were more than thrilled to have these ready-made meals available then. When her mom went back to work it was all about the Hamburger Helper, LaChoy Chicken Chow Mein, frozen dinners, fish sticks and canned chili; these became the staples of her school years, and in time, of mine.

The thing is, with processed food you don't much see, well, the meat. Everything comes out of a box or a can or a package of some sort. She was a single mom and did the best she could with what she had, I suppose. But then I started spending summers with my dad around the age of five or so. Charlie grilled and ate meat. Hunted deer. I watched a lot of television at night with sitters while he was out on patrol, and after a while, some things started hitting home.

I guess it started with the pig in Babe. Who could eat pork after that? Bacon was harder than hell, but I gave it up. And then Sebastian in the Little Mermaid a couple of years later, choking on his choler while he watched the chef make crab soup. No seafood for me. My mother, bless her Stouffer's-loving heart, started worrying about my protein intake. She got away with feeding me steak for a while. When I asked where it came from, she said, beef. I didn't know beef came from a cow, I thought it was an entity unto itself. Give me a break, I was just a stupid little kid. And even then, I guess I kinda liked steak.

In second grade my best friend had a parakeet, and there went the chicken. On Thanksgiving I ate turkey for a few years, until the sight of that carcass at the table made me gag. Don't get me started on the whole roasted goat at the fourth of July barbecues. My family is a bunch of Neanderthals.

Not me, not anymore. No animals are harmed in the production of my life. Not since I've been in control of it, anyway.

And now my clothes are 100% organic cotton and so are my shoes, sandals made of rope and fair trade rubber. Eco-friendly fair-trade everything. I can't even eat gelatin. I allow a little dairy, but I don't feel good about it. The good stuff, the hormone-free, free-range kindly kind of dairy costs a fortune so I only allow myself a bite of cheese or a shot glass of milk once in a while. Seriously, I pour it in a shot glass. I'm kinda-sorta headed toward vegan. Weaning, here. Eww, I just heard that.

But I feel like a fraud a lot of the time. I look like the real deal, a genuine hippie, but in my heart, I want to be mainstream here and there. It's just so hard to be politically correct 24/7. Global warming and the polar bears and recycling and all that weighs on you after a while. I'd like to say what the fuck, and just be sometimes, you know? Just be.

I might get strung up at work if anyone heard me talking like that. My supervisor is such a New Age Nazi about it all. She says her life goal is to produce no waste. Sounds good, right? Try to do it. Just try. Ugh.

All this goes through my mind as I get dressed, standard boho skirt and sandals in antique rose and beige respectively, clingy v-neck tee. I brush my hair out and leave it long, not much makeup, but a little. It's nice of Jasper to drive all the way out to my cabin in Fairview to get me. I'll have to bake him some brownies or something.

It's nearly nine, and I haven't eaten since those wasabi pancakes. Just when I go to text Alice that I'll take a rain check and have Kashi for dinner again on a Friday night I hear a honk and look out the window. It's Jazz in his vintage marine blue Jeep. Some guy with a reddish-brown mop of hair is in the passenger seat. Great. I'm not in much of a mood to socialize, but I suppose I'll have to do it now. I give my rescue French bulldog, Clarice, a pat on the head and a cheesy treat before I head out the door.


End file.
